What inspired the name of the band? What are your influences and are they the same as when you started out?
Kaity: This is the most frequently asked question for our band. Al our keyboard player has a keen interest in birds-and oddly enough his favourite is just the common chicken. We wanted to do a nod to his fun little obsession and tagged it on to ‘Sunflower Fox’ which I came up with while writing song lyrics in our drummer’s basement.
How and why do you write what you write?
Al: The songwriting approach for Sunflower Fox usually starts with someone, often Kaity, bringing a starting idea to the table. This is then opened up to influences from the rest of the group that shape and mold the song over many iterations that take us to the final product. The beautiful thing is that we all contribute to the songs and are very open to feedback from each other to help explore new avenues.
When we start off on a specific song, we know the general style and potential instrumentation that we want to explore but it is a blurred roadmap. Many times we take complete changes and detours into unanticipated directions depending on how the songs evolve, so the final product may have themes that were not even considered at the start.
Al: We love the sound (and culture) of the 1970’s! Everyone in the group cut their teeth playing 70’s music, mostly rock ‘n roll like Sunflower Fox’s sound, but our collective experiences span genres from that era. The thing we absolutely admire about the 1970’s sound is that the music from that time was real, it wasn’t overly processed and “clean”, it was raw and emotional. A lot of that is due to the record methods, which were live tracking as a band, not endless overdubs, that bring the live experience and emotion into the studio. That is what Sunflower Fox recreates when we are writing and recording, with real, analog instrumentation and experienced players.
How and why do you write what you write?
Al: The songwriting approach for Sunflower Fox usually starts with someone, often Kaity, bringing a starting idea to the table. This is then opened up to influences from the rest of the group that shape and mold the song over many iterations that take us to the final product. The beautiful thing is that we all contribute to the songs and are very open to feedback from each other to help explore new avenues.
When we start off on a specific song, we know the general style and potential instrumentation that we want to explore but it is a blurred roadmap. Many times we take complete changes and detours into unanticipated directions depending on how the songs evolve, so the final product may have themes that were not even considered at the start.
Al: We love the sound (and culture) of the 1970’s! Everyone in the group cut their teeth playing 70’s music, mostly rock ‘n roll like Sunflower Fox’s sound, but our collective experiences span genres from that era. The thing we absolutely admire about the 1970’s sound is that the music from that time was real, it wasn’t overly processed and “clean”, it was raw and emotional. A lot of that is due to the record methods, which were live tracking as a band, not endless overdubs, that bring the live experience and emotion into the studio. That is what Sunflower Fox recreates when we are writing and recording, with real, analog instrumentation and experienced players.
Live?
Al: Sunflower Fox’s songbook is readily transferable to live performance as we do minimal overdubs and selective effects. We don’t rely on huge layering to achieve our sound, we get it with live instrumentation, just like in the 1970’s. Certain songs might require a bit of creativity where there are some additional layers of extra vocals or keyboards, but in general we can reproduce what we do in the studio live.
Live?
Al: Sunflower Fox’s songbook is readily transferable to live performance as we do minimal overdubs and selective effects. We don’t rely on huge layering to achieve our sound, we get it with live instrumentation, just like in the 1970’s. Certain songs might require a bit of creativity where there are some additional layers of extra vocals or keyboards, but in general we can reproduce what we do in the studio live.
What plans do you have for the future?
So right now there are quite a few things we’re working on: we’re finishing mixing album #2, we’re writing album #3 and in the infancy of planning a tour of the UK in 2024. So we’ll see how that goes